Amplified Gratitude

Snowdrops blooming in the garden today!

Sometimes angels sneak up on us and whisper profound, life changing secrets right into our hearts.   One Sunday, Pastor Peter hit me with a message so wise and helpful it took my breath away.

"The opposite of love is not hatred, but fear," Pastor Peter said. It was like he'd given me the secret handbook to life.  The opposite of happiness is not unhappiness but fear, the opposite of courage is fear, the opposite of creativity is fear.

Fear is the one trump card the Crazy Old Lady who lives in our heads has.  Her whole hand is the fear card. 

Fear tells us you're no good, you're self-indulgent, you have no talent, you're embarrassing your family, you're too emotional, you are wasting your time, you are too old, too fat and too stupid....the list goes on and on.

Happiness shrugs it's shoulders and says, "Well it may all be true, but who cares?" It takes our big scary monsters and personal demons and shrinks them down to size.  

Wonderful, just great, you may be thinking. Sign me up for that happiness pill,  book, program, whatever it is because I could really use some tonic for the pile of unpaid bills, the kids fighting, all of the folks who made me mad this week, the harsh thing my sweety said last night and the pile of laundry getting moldy in the basement.

There's no book, no pill, no program. Here's how to let a little squeak of happiness into your life-- amplify your gratitude.  

Just notice what makes you smile, feel a little warmer, a little lighter, stop resisting whatever is happening in your life, if only just for a second. Gratitude puts a stop to the  ceaseless yearning and longing for something else. Gratitude allows us to take delight in whatever is right in front of us.  

When I started noticing the warmth of sunshine on a late winter day, I could, just in that one moment feel a spark of gratitude.  I'll admit it was slow going at first and required effort to find five things I could be grateful for each day. Day by day, it got easier to find gratitude in more and more things.

Research suggests that if you record at five things that you are grateful for each day, you'll feel happier. Just five, every day. Better than a pill more like magic, you'll feel happier!

One of my wise and busy friends, Lisa,--a mother of two, owner of her own business with a husband and two dogs (not sure how Andy will feel about being lumped in with the dogs, but he's friendly, loyal and trustworthy so hopefully he'll take it well) uses DayOne app to take a picture and record a one-word diary entry on her smart phone.  However you choose to record your gratitude, just do it.  

As a way to get you thinking about what makes you grateful here are 10 things in my life that make me feel grateful:

Notes from friends

Hanging laundry on the line

Wearing hats

Taking a walk

Serendipity

Bike Riding

Sweet corn in August

Summer nights on the porch

 

Days spent on the water

Gardens, especially creating beauty in my own garden

And one bonus gratitude

First Snow

Dear ones I'd love to hear what makes you grateful. As a special thank you for sharing I'll be giving away this unique one-of-a-kind painting I made to one lucky winner who shares what makes you grateful in the comments below. Deadline for submissions is next Tuesday.

Dear readers you fill me with gratitude.  Take good care of each other until next week.  And don't forget to leave a comment!

Notes

The art of letter writing is almost dead.  I can't recall the last letter I received.  My good friend Dixie who lives in Ohio used to send me letters, but now sends me nice long emails instead.  

I'm part of the problem. I almost never, as my far-away friends can attest, send a note, a card, a letter, even crafting an email is a chore I postpone.

Like many of the fine things in life, what I love to receive, I'm often stingy on giving.

And then Megan moved across the street.  Almost weekly I receive 

a lovely, hand-written note from Megan.

Look at the lovely detail of real flowers, (they were very prettily sitting on this wicker table when I arrived home one day--the flowers were fresh that day) the masking taped "Thanks".  Megan can make even standard stock envelopes clever, homey and fresh.

I've never received a note on the same stationary, or card stock.  

She even sealed one of the envelopes with a wax seal with her last name initialed into the seal.

Living next door to Megan, I've learned to expect the unexpected, like this lovely invitation

to a picnic.  A knife and fork, simple, and perfect....oh and the picnic on the banks of the lovely Cedar River was divine.

After dispensing some gardening advice, I received this 

lovely thank you note

With a proposed design for an address and sign for the front of our property.  As you can probably tell "Our" Megan is a lovely designer at Select Cabinetry and Design  www.selectcd.com. I adore living across the street from such a clever and generous woman.

Until, I walked onto my porch and discovered another Megan "note"

Note the clever screw holding the note to.....what is it you may ask?!

A giant puffball mushroom.  According to Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puffball as long as it's not the stemmed kind, it's safe to eat. Megan may be taking cleverness too far?!

This thing is big enough to feed an army (note paper plate and coffee cup for scale.)  Prince Charming says he's having no part in this experiment.  Tune in again next week to see how the cooking of the monster puffball turns out!